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THE LORD REIGNETH : 




FEWWOEDS 

SODAY MORMXG, April IGtli, ISG^^ 

AFTER THE ASSASSINATION OF 

ABRAHAM LINCOLN 



BY 

JAMES DeNOEMANDIE, 

Minister of the Soutli Parish, Portsmouth, N. H. 



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My CiiftJsTiAN F^RiExS'Ds,— 1 have rio sermorl,afi(;1 
there will be no preaching here to-day. For 
the first time I confess I wish I were not your 
minister, expected to say a word of consolation or 
help, which word I have not. Whenever I seek 
words, there come only tears ; but I could wish to 
be one of you, meeting here to weep out our com- 
mon grief, while in the sacred silence of this tem- 
ple of God we re- assure ourselves that the Lord 
reigneth. Sometime when we are more calm I 
shall speak to you at length of our sorrow, our 
loss and our duty. 

What means this oveiflow of tears wide as a 
continent ? What mean these bells answering 
bells in solemn dirge all over our land? What 
mean these graspingsof hand with hand when no 
word escapes the lips ? What mean these anxious 
inquiries, these mute looks, this hope against hope 
for some denial of our sad news, these mutterings 
of vengeance, these streets lined with black, the 
air filled with murmurings, the very heavens 
joining in our tears ? What voice have these 
strange drapings in our house of worship,— -this 
emblem of our national glory, which at our last 
meeting told such a tale of joy, now too heavy 
with sorrow to speak at all— these flowers, which 
came to join in our thanksgiving for the immor- 
tal life brought to light to day, breathing their 
fragrance over an invisible bier, on which rests an 
invisible body? "He is not here, he is riseji." 



Our President has been murdered ! What made 
us love him, so that the humble citizen, taken by- 
God from a western cabin, had well nigh won the 
homage of the world ? What makes each one of 
us feel a perso.ial grief, such as no ruler has ever 
called forth before ? It was this simply : This 
man of God was true to the noblest principles 
which warm human breasts. Untaught in schools, 
but wise for any emergency ; unskilled in diplo- 
macy, but more than a match for any intrigue ; 
temperate in the midst of every temptation ; fear- 
less in the presence of any danger ; hopeful under 
every defeat ; calm in every success ; humble in 
every exaltation ; powerful and yet prudent ; 
firm and yet lenient ; patriotic and yet humane ; 
liberal and yet just ; humorous and yet solemn — 
Abraham Lincoln walked by faith and not by 
sight, and he was not, for God took him. 

There is but one word of hope or trust. The 
Lord reigneth. Do not let us forget or doubt that, 
my friends,for one moment.or everything is gone. 
You will hear this question asked by some in utter 
despair. What are we all coming to ? Let not us 
ask it, or harbor the despair. What are we com- 
ing to? Why my christian friends we are just 
following out the results of a cause which is suf- 
ficient for all these things, and a great deal more; 
for all that has happened, and a great deal still to 
happen. It is all coming about as naturally as 
the warm sun is calling all nature into life to-day. 
You may think it severe, you may think it 
strange, you may think it narrow, you may think 



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it partizan, yon ma^^ think of it as you wUt-^ 
but remember this ; the time will come Avhen yoi^ 
look at it ill the light of Christian principle an<« 
Christian retribution, and say with me, not a sin- 
gle thing has happened for which we have not 
had in slavery a sufficient and plain cause. 

Our President has been murdered ! Who murder- 
ed bim ? That is something for you to consider 
n your hearts,else we learn nothing from our ca- 
amity. Who muderedhim ? They tell us it was 
Booth, an actor. No, it was not Booth. He wag 
only an instrument of others. They tell us it 
was a maniac in a moment of frenzy. No, it w;-.!, 
not a maniac. It icas the calmest deliberation of the 
most reflecting and honorable supporters of slavery for 
the last two hundred yearsl The maturity and cul- 
mination, I trust, of thi^ iniquity. Every man 
who has ever said a word in defence, or extenua- 
tion of this, helped murcJer our President. Every 
man who has ever said a word in defence or sym- 
pathy with the confederacy based on this iniquity, 
helped murder our President. Every man who 
has withheld his word of support or sympathy for 
this nation struggling for a broader freedoni, 
helped murder our President. Every minister 
who has stifled his prayer, or forborne the utter 
auce of his heart's conviction, or permitted his 
sanctuary to be a refuge for the nation's destroy- 
ers, has helped murder our President. 

Abraham Lincoln was a noble man. Noble his 
life — forever sacred be his memory. He was all 
American ; a true representative of what this peo- 



pie may become^ He was not my choice for Pres- 
ident the first time, but he soon won ray heart. — 
I have read somewhat of the history of the past 
four thousand years, and I find there the record 
of no nobler, truer, simpler, grander man. But he 
is dead. 

The Lord reigneth. God be thanked He has 
not permitted very much of the world's progress 
to rest upon any one m'an. The very highest, 
the very greatest are quite insignificant when we 
think of this mighty march of the soul of hu- 
manity. We think otherwise. We think it all 
depended upon cjne man we call Leader, General, 
Emperor, King, President, Minister, Pope. It did 
not. We call his death untimely. Nothing is 
Untimely, from the quiet and unseen opening of 
yonder leaf, and its fall some day next autumn 
when a gentle wind shakes the bough, all along 
up the series of events to where a demon robs a 
nation of its choicest treasure. Everything comes 
in the fulness of time,from the blessing of yester- 
day to the Resurrection of the world's Redeemer. 
It is all of God. God gave us our Chief Magis- 
trate, Gcd preserved his life until he did his work ; 
and think what a work it was ! Who shall say 
it was not done, and well done ? But most cer- 
tainly there was something for another to do. 
Perhaps in that great heart which knew no jeal. 
ousy, no envy, no bitterness, and could harbor no 
unkind feeling, and no shadow of revenge to- 
wards one of the human kind, there was also 
wanting some of that quality which measures out 



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justice to the guilty. What that work wa?, tho 
days will fast reveal ; and whatever it was, God 
kept it for others to do. 

God gave him, God took him. Yes, my friends 
most sacredly remember both. We are too apt 
to think that it is only by a lingering death, by a 
long or severe sickness, or in a good old age, that 
God takes one away. The other deaths we some- 
times thoughtlessly call untimely and unnatural. 
But God works by miracles sometimes, and then we 
do not stop to read the natural laws under which 
they come. I am very sure it was his Providenc- 
that called our President away from that Wash- 
ington Theatre, as truly as if he had fallen qui- 
etly asleep in a good old age. One man dies; but 
in God's way ; and by God's hand another is 
raised up, and the principle lives on. Each man 
fills a place no other can. We ought not to want 
him to ; but from all these myriads, God will show 
us one or many to carry on His work ; and if this 
struggle be not His Avork, it matters little whether 
we have another President or not. 

I spoke last Thursday of the Christian doctrine 
of retribution, and said a cry for it would come 
up from the friends of the prisoners, from the 
bereaved and sorrowing hearts, from the freed- 
men . That cry to-day is wide as the nation. I 
loved our President as I have never loved any 
public man, and yet, now that he has been mur- 
dered, I have not a single feeling of revenge. I 
call for no vengeance, but we must demand j)un- 
ishment. Not for the murderer merely. Why, 



Ii would not have even him hanged. There are 
many thousands all through our land far more to 
blame than he. I do not ask for their blood. I 
])ray to day that not a drop of blood may be shed, 
tliough life is not much ; but I call for punish- 
ment, for Christian punishment, for punishment, 
for past transgressions, for present rebelliousness, 
for the sake of future safety ; and let punishment 
fall wherever it belongs, North or South. Let a 
cry for justice go up which shall make this con- 
tinent ring, and the guilty tremble. Justice 
which none but the guilty ever fear. Law which 
none but the law-breakers ever dread. 

Our President is dead. He rests from his labors, 
and his works do follow him. Rest in peace, thou 
noble martyr, while every heart hastens to pay a 
son of America, while thy land learns the lesson 
tribute and drop a tear 6n thy grave. Rest in peace 
of thy life. Rest in peace, child of liberty, while 
her anthem swells to a purer strain over thy 
memory. Rest in peace, child of the Infinite, 
with all the immortal company. 

Oar President is not dead. He still speaks. He 
is 7iotdeady for the memory of virtue is immortal. 
Re is not dead and here is our only suflticient con- 
solation* 

To-day is kept very sacred in the Christian 
church, as commemorating the resurrection of 
Jesus, wliich brought life, and immortality to 
light. I was intending to speak to you this 
morning from that passage in Mark's gospel, xvi. 
chap. 4th verse, — when as the three women were 
going to the sepulchre to annoint the body oj 
their Master with spices, — the tribute of affection 



after the custom of the age, and as the early sun 
was just giving his rays to light their way, — it 
occurred to them that a great stone which had 
been put as a guard by the door, would defeat their 
pious purpose ; but when they came to it, and 
looked up, behold ! the stone was already rolled 
away. 

A simple incident, indeed, but how deep its 
meaning, how grand its tfuth, how universal its 
experience. We too, go along with b'jwed heads 
and mourning hearts, raising doubts or question- 
ing possibilities, or wondering whence our aid is 
to come, or what we shall do when we reach the 
end, — when there, we lift up our eyes and it has 
all vanished, the danger, the dread, like some 
phantom which has taken to itself fearful pro- 
portions, like some great body of human form, 
which turns out only a stone, and that, rolled 
away from where our path leads. Oh ! my 
Christian friends, a bold and trusting, and per- 
severing soul finds no stone against the door, but 
always enters without hindrance among the guard - 
ing angels by the Saviour's side. 

It was a short and easy step for our departed 
President from the theatre of earth to the thea- 
tre of heaven. The evening light was mortal, 
I tut the morning light was full of immortality. 
It was a short way through a green pasture, and 
beside a quiet stream, with the Lord Jesus lead- 
ing. We have two words to strengthen and com- 
fort us. 

" The Lord is risen " 

" Be still and know that I am God." 



' B S '12 



